Classified ads are a great place to find people taking liberties with language. People always talk about having a 'Genuine reason for sale'. As opposed to what, an artificial reason? I don't want to be buying a car, ask why it is being sold and have the man go, 'Well, next week I'm moving to Kazakhstan with Dame Kelly Holmes and our 16 illegitimate children. I don't need the car; we're riding there on a cart pulled by Red Rum and Shergar'.
The problem with those adverts is that you have a limited number of words, so short, familiar phrases like this are used. These limitations causes further problems. The best advert I ever saw was in a cycling magazine. I think it was advertising a bike, although it could have been the Virgin Mary. It started off alright, a couple of lines describing the bike. Then it said, 'Genuine reason for sale. Never ridden, wife is pregnant'.
I rang him up anyway, because I was interested in buying a bike. He said 'have you got anywhere to put it?' - I said 'Well I've got room in the stable, I suppose'.
It frightens me just how many uses of the word 'fuck' there somehow happens to be. But how is it actually possible to 'shut the fuck up?' What, exactly, is the 'fuck' in this context? It could only be some sort of German suitcase manufacturer I've never heard of. As in:
'Right, darling, so I've packed the clothes, the suncream and the travellers' cheques. What should I do now?'
'Oh, just shut the fuck up, will you?!'
'Okay, done that, now what?'
'Now get the fuck out of here!'
That could work, I guess.
People go on about how friends, couples and partners apparently get on 'like a house on fire'. Well excuse me. I've watched the news - I've seen houses on fire. I happen to know that's not an experience you'd be happy to replicate. It doesn't work the other way round though. People don't go, 'Well, my house burnt down like a very cute couple'.
I suppose its something about the metaphorical 'heat' or 'sparks' that two people experience when they are together.
Anyway, I knew a guy who was going out with this quite wonderful girl who people said that about, and I was really, really jealous of him. Even I joined in however, saying that they were just like a house on fire. And I suppose I was right to say so, because she was hot and he asphyxiated to death in his sleep.
The court case hasn't come up yet and anyway, I have an alibi.
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